Once more into the breach…

The Boston Globe, weighing in on public radio, is notably unhelpful:

Bring back music and culture programming. NPR's news reports are thoughtful and compelling. Its talk shows are topical and a nice way to bring listeners into conversations. And "Car Talk" is great entertainment. But occasionally all this talk is wearying. Balance could be provided by music shows and radio documentaries.

But as anyone who's actually studied this subject knows, public radio listeners overwhelmingly don't want music. They want talk. The Globe's editors are free to have their own desires, but it's just silly for them to lecture public radio, as if their own opinion had to be right. At least they should learn why public radio makes the choices that it does.

And then, sigh, there's this:

What's going on outside the often overwhelmingly adolescent world of popular music? Who are the up-and-comers in jazz and classical music? NPR should take more time and programming space to offer answers.

Sure, why not? But "the often overwhelmingly adolescent world of popular music" -- serious people just have to stop talking like that. As anyone who knows anything about popular music will tell you, there's a lot of serious work that may well have even more trouble getting on the radio than classical music does. Think about it. Classical radio stations still exist. But how many stations -- apart from college radio -- play the kind of pop music that doesn't get on any pop charts?

There's one radio format, AAA ("adult album alternative") that might come close, but even then, there's music too serious, too gritty to be played commercially. Neil Young's new album was described in this past Sunday's New York Times as a novel, told in music and text. Has any radio station broadcast it complete?

(NOTE! Sometimes I get e-mail from people who want to tell me what trash pop music is. Let me say right now that I'm not engaging in that debate -- unless, that is, my critics show me they actually know something about the pop music they love to hate. If they want to tell me pop music is trash, let them do it with specific references to songs and albums by pop musicians that smart people take seriously.)